Wednesday, July 24, 2013

Vote Early, Vote Often! : GW2


Were there Election monitors observing the current shenanigans in Labyrinthine Cliffs they'd probably all have given up in despair and gone home by now. Or possibly they'd just be standing around wondering what the heck they were doing there in the first place.

Real election to follow. Possibly.
It's not even clear to me whether this is an election, let alone the election. Oh, sure, we know there's a vacant place on the council and there are only two candidates, the passive-aggressive, submissive yet authoritarian "Captain" Ellen Kiel and the sneaky, smug libertarian fat-cat Evon Gnashblade, but what's going on right now seems to be a popularity contest to decide who gets to sign a trade deal with the Zephyrites, not any kind of binding election to the Captain's Council.

What passes for logic among the Zephyrites doesn't bear thinking about. Their whole society seems to be modeled on some kind of 1960s hippy commune, albeit one that really could have levitated The Pentagon.  Their guiding principle might as well be "it seemed like a good idea at the time" and their version of the Great Society certainly doesn't cleave to any ideal of "one man, one vote" (make that "one sentient, any gender, one vote").

Hah! Good luck with that, whiskers!
Voting slips turn up all over the place. Stuff your pockets then stuff the ballot. Every vote counts so make sure you use them all. If you can't find enough, just buy some! There's a guy standing right next to the voting boxes hawking them for fourteen silver pieces each or ten for a gold and he has an unlimited supply.

This Rotten Borough Recreation Event runs a couple of weeks. Just think how many hundreds, no, thousands of votes you could cast! Then one of the candidates is going to sign a trade agreement with this bunch of mystical folksingers just as they wave goodbye for some new Woodstock Nation of the Sky, leaving us with no-one to trade with. How does that work again?

I'm confused, although no more than I have been throughout the entire Living Story. Oh what the hell, let's just go with it.

Vote Gnasher!

You know it makes no sense!

12 comments:

  1. I'm voting for Kiel. Evon is a scum bucket that just happens to have a nicer mini game. :P

    Too bad my (somewhat questionable) attempt to lure other votes for Ellen isn't working at all:

    https://forum-en.guildwars2.com/forum/livingworld/cutthroat/Vote-for-Kiel-Vote-for-Art/first#post2476542

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    1. Well maybe people want to have the Fall of Abaddon fractal instead of the other, ever think of that? I for one refuse to vote for Ellen due to that fact, plus, Charr. 'Nuff said.

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  2. Gnashblade is a gladium who doesn't actively seek a new warband. How could you vote him as a self-respecting Charr.

    The update itself is the same old though. Love the mini games. Hate the achievements. But the Candidate Trials, in particular, is pretty interesting since it has 4 levels of difficulty AND scales with party members. Great design, we need more stuff like that (and SAB)

    -Ursan

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    1. Surely all Charr can't be part of the military? Are all those crazy farmers out in Diessa also in Warbands? What kind of "warband" runs a farm where everyone dresses up as cows? And what about all the merchants? If Charr society is modeled on Imperial Rome, well there was a lot more to Rome than just the Legions.

      Gnashblade's probably an Asura in a clever Golem suit, anyway.

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    2. "Gnashblade's probably an Asura in a clever Golem suit, anyway."

      Vote Gnashblade, the only subterranean lizard people approved candidate!

      As you move along to map completion, if you are talking to all the NPCs you find, there are a number of gladium, for most of them it is the same story as you find with many of the lone Asura out in the periphery, most come to see being "outside" their societies as being free to pursue whatever passes happiness, the pressure to conform is gone.

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    3. The entire Charr society is geared towards warfare. There are warbands dedicated to agriculture, lumberjacking, child-rearing, etc. (Note the timber-related names of Charr in the Diessa logging mills, for example) The warband is a central aspect of Charr culture, and it's a huge social stigma if a Charr is a gladium (i.e. laments of Charr gladium strewn across Diessa/Ashford/Personal Story). Even many Charr who have joined the Orders of Tyria still have ties to their warband (i.e. Whispers Charr in Fireheart working together with his former warband)

      Which makes Gnashblade a huge embarrassment for Charr, since he's not even actively trying to join a warband. So yea, he's probably an Asura in a clever Golem suit.

      -Ursan

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  3. I have recently returned to GW2 so busy levelling up new character (55 now) so I don’t pay attention to all theses world events and out of the loop on them. Should I pay attention and do some these world events? Are they worth/need doing or should I just level up for now?

    I think I got some vote tokens as random drops in some level 45 zone. Should I use these and vote? Is there any reward for voting?

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  4. Yes you should do them, because you get achievements. And you need achievement points because GOODY BOXES! :)

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    1. @lostforever You have put your finger on the crux of the problem. What you *should* do is whatever the heck you want to do. That's the correct answer. However, if what you choose to do doesn't include the new content dumped on our heads every other week then you'll miss out on the ongoing storyline and with it many limited-time activities, drops, rewards, titles and other toys. On top of that you won't be where the majority of players are clustered so you'll miss out on a good deal of the social aspect of the game, the buzz and chatter and excitement.

      Then, since GW2 has recently been re-tooled to put Achievements at the forefront of progression, as Unknown rightly points out you'll miss out on some very significant material rewards, or at least the opportunity to get them faster.

      On the other hand, if you do try to do all the new stuff as it appears you risk feeling manipulated, directed and judged, losing control of your own goals and interests and quite possibly getting really fed up.

      I recommend taking a good look at each event as it appears and deciding on a case-by-case basis. At least that way you retain *some* dignity.

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  5. I think MMO works better when they allow you to set your own goals. So far in GW2 I have been setting my own goals such as do some level up, harvesting, crafting, map completion etc and I am doing them on my *own* pace and enjoying myself along the way. All of these activities are *grind* but since I am dictating the pace they don’t feel that way.

    I did bit more research into Living world events and I kind of like some of the things on offer but I don’t want to do this content right now. However I can’t put it off for too long since some of it might go away. This annoys me greatly since Anet is dictating the pace and telling me how I should play this game. This got me thinking about why this content is temporary and not permanent and I can’t come up with any positive reasons.

    Another thing I noticed is that pre 80 zones are pretty much empty and I am on “high” population server. Due to this, levelling up is difficult and lonely affair. No one to do dynamic events, kill champions or even talk to! I am pretty much levelling up by killing monsters and doing renowned hearts. I consider myself a social player and enjoy taking part in world/zone chat and all the banter etc. so no one around to talk is even worse than no one around to kill champions! I wish they do something to revitalize the pre 80 zones. A quick fix may be “under flow” servers. I mean they have the tech for “over flow” servers.

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    1. An "underflow" server isn't as easy to implement as you think. What would be the cut-off for it, and how would you re-populate the main server which is going to be even more dead. If, say, if a map has less than 10 players you push them all into "underflow," what happens to the next player that enters the map. Does he go straight into the underflow? Will players get kicked out of underflow when that happens, disrupting whatever they were doing?

      But anyways, my advise for sub-80 zones is to just call out events in map chat. Sometimes there are people. Especially in zones where there are world bosses that drop rares (i.e iron marches, sparkfly) if you go at the right time there will be swarms of people, and often a few of them are willing to check stuff out while they wait for their PvClaw loot pinata to spawn.

      -Ursan

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    2. 1-20 zones are very busy most of the time, particularly Wayfarer Hills and Queensdale. There's a huge amount of choice in the 20 - 60 range so people do spread out a lot. Any map that has a Dragon or similar tends to be busy though.

      Remember that your level scales down so if you find a sweet map spot on your server you can use it even after you "outlevel" it. You never actually outlevel anything. Conversely, most Living Story hot-spots will kick you up to 80 - a lot of people have been using that for leveling and those spots are always busy.

      I leveled several characters almost exclusively in WvW. Get in a zerg and watch the xp just pour in. Also craft - that gives great xp.

      Leveling in GW2 is extremely easy compared to most MMOs - almost anything you do gives xp. If you want to be in a crowd while you level I recommend:

      WvW (especially in WXP trains)
      "Dragon" events (check guildwarstemple.com for our server)
      Living Story current map (Cliffs as I write)
      Fractals (if you like dungeon play)

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